Another
by eyyore
Summary: My sweat turns purple, again and again. He says his name with pride, even when I peel off his face.
1. My Dear Reader

It was a dark and stormy night when I received word. "Yet again", two words seem to melt off the crumpled piece of paper as I tightened my fist. "Curses", I muttered under my breath as I threw the paper ball across the room.

"Do you not know any curse words, Mr A?" he whispered.

I stared at the paper ball that lay on the ground beside the wastepaper basket.

"You're not in the mood for conversation now are you?"

I started walking towards that paper ball. "Can one practice paper ball throws?" I mused as I placed the crumpled piece of paper gingerly into the basket.

"I can teach you some curse words, if you want. Oh no, not the ones your delusional mind has let you to think. Words turning air into elements? Pfft.

Let's start with an everyday activity. You'd call it 'doing my business', I prefer to be direct: shit!"

Startled, I turned towards the direction of the voice. There lay one chained to the chair. I tried to mimic the movies, a singular lightbulb hung on the ceiling, its light periodically flickering. The person seemed to have found a comfortable position on the plastic chair. "Curses", I muttered to myself again. I need to find a way to prevent that compromise.

"You seem quite fond of putting someone in shackles, Mr A, while keeping your words relatively sanitised." I swore I could spot a grin on the person's face, but at that very moment the bulb chose to flicker out before coming back to life a mere second later.

"Ah curses. No wait, shit, shit shit shit, indeed." I spat out while I journeyed back to the table.

"Something has gone wrong , I presume? What a pity." He smiled.

I stared at the items on the table. For two days I have been exploring the intricacies of the human anatomy. It was a rather pleasant learning journey, except for the times when the person screamed. That gave me a headache. The nervous system is a marvellous work of art. For the first hour since I lobbed off the person's feet there was no sound at all. The person sat still while chatting with me, seemingly oblivious to the fact that both feet were now gone permanently. The body detects enormous amounts of pain and sideloads it by flooding the point of contact with suppressing agents. Something to that effect, I would know if I was in medical school. The body then prevents shock by removing the ability to feel pain. In doing so one loses to ability to feel anything at all at the point of contact. Rather ingenious if I might add.

2 hours in I decided to wrap the person's legs in white linen. I drew the line at the person's kneecap. After all, I didn't want the person to lose all consciousness. There can be no failure in my mission.

"Yet again?" The person asked.

I jumped involuntarily. "Did he see it?" I thumping began. My hands rushed through my pockets until I found the small bottle. Picking out the red and blue pills I dumped them straight down the throat and gulped air for good measure.

Crisis averted. My vision turned hazy for a moment before everything returned. Three thumps more than the last, I am running out of time.

"Well" I fixed a smile as I looked at his carved face. "Since you were so kind to ask me to repeat my procedure, I will fulfill your wish."

"Shit." 

*****break******** 

It takes me 4 tries before I succeeded in jabbing the tube up the exposed nostrils of his. By some magic streaks of muscles still line the portion of his face, tenuously holding together the façade of a person. But I am not to be blamed. No, I am a victim too, my dear reader, in every way possible.

Ah, silence, sweet unending silence.

I leave the bulb flickering as I closed the wooden door with caution. Not that the patient would know about the mise-en-scene that resembled the set with the budget of a gore-exploitation student film. You know the ones, those bespectacled pale faced vampires that prowl the local movies in search for the next big thing, also lamenting out to us plebeians about some movie technicality. Screw that angle, the panning shot, screw these things! "Magic!", those uppity bastards would go on. Magic is putting food on the table, magic is having a bulb still working after a static storm. Magic is, him.

Forgive me reader, I must have wandered off into some crevice. Apologies.

I stagger up the stairs on fours, stopping to droop my head onto the steps, leaving just a slit of air between my face and the wooden planks. It's purple. My sweat is purple again. It also turns purple after one of my sessions. Takes me hours to wait it out.

I can hear a whole week's worth of advertisements playing as I journey pass the dusty chairs. The water in the pail turns light purple as I dunk my head into the collection of rainwater just beside the coffee table. As droplets cloud my vision I see it again. I see him again. I see it on the table and him taking it up, pointing at me with bloodshot eyes, mouthing words that I can never recall or hear or enunciate.

He always collapses before he finishes his damn sentence, his wood stick falling through the air while spinning like a jet in free fall.

I gingerly lift the wood stick off the coffee table. No sparks this time. I have realised that the best way to keep static off this damn wooden thing was to place it on glass. Now dear reader I am not too familiar with science, given that my 5th grade teacher was high on herbs most of the time. But I do know that wood cannot, and should not generate static. But what do I know?

There it lies before me, refuge before I start all over again. I wave my hands limply to push some cardboard boxes with leftovers inside them and lay as my head tries to sweat purple and threaten to sweat out all my blood. I read it the other time, purple blood, something to do with oxygen or the like. But who knows. But that's not the point, my dear reader, I should tell you my patient's name and his current imprisonment under my shack of a house. You see, when I sweat purple I am just like him. Face, skin colour, accent, words, even strange sounds that come clicking out of his mouth.

I am Mr A, my dear reader. And my patient, he calls himself 'magical'. I know jack shit about him, but all I know is that no one pronounces two words together like he does, expecting you to bow to him and kiss his rump of a leg.

His name, and ugh, I'll need to bleach my lips after saying this, is Harry Potter.


	2. Subspace

Mia wrinkled her nose as she was handed a rather large serving of good ol' wheat bread.

"Why would anyone want that with their bacon?"

She stared at the piece of yeast-induced staple with suspicion, fork at the ready to defend herself in the event the bread became sentient.

"Because it helps you grow taller."

That was excuse number twenty nine, I recycled my excuses to appease her. Sometimes it is a good thing she's still a growing child having breakfast. I lifted a slice onto her plate as she proceeded to scowl at me while putting the bread to her lips. I could never understand this daily pouting morning ritual. Kids.

A loud crash caused me to spill juice all over my plate. The bread was still between her mouth and hands, good. She stared out of the window as I stood to investigate the rather irritating disturbance.

And off she ran.

I panicked as it happened again. Time and time I stand rooted as my peripheral vision blurred. Not again, not now. I turned to catch one last glimpse at her as I hear an incomprehensible yell followed by a thud.

I try to move, and I hate every fibre of my body for being too slow, too late. A failure. Perpetual failure. My mind attempts to draw an image of the tiles and ends up showing me a smorgasbord of colours as I race to greet the floor.

Ten, nine, eight.

Time always stops for me when it came to this part. Perhaps one day we'll discover an alternate reality filled with sunspace drawers of time prepped and ready. Time-To-Go they might call it, fit for moments such as these when some omniscient one decides to draw out slivers of seconds for theatrics. Pure entertainment.

Seven, six, five.

Now sounds seem to return to the fore. Sometimes it's the tolling of a grandfather clock. Sometimes it's punctuated rings of the doorbell. Sometimes the space is filled with chatter of the most wondrous and yet alien mutterings. Today it was the sound of a man speaking too fast over booming thumps of what I assume would be the floor.

Four to one comes too quickly as my mind overreacts as it assumes I'm in free fall. One jerk or a shudder. All melding together as sound and sight collapses.

I wake.

The TV is still stuck on a rerun of some wretched sitcom I've never had the time to enjoy. I glance towards the corner of the room. 12:43pm. I overslept again. Life without Mia has me relapsing into the habits of my college days. I sweep the takeaway boxes of my table searching for the goddamn remote to mute these plastic people laughing at each other.

"Dadda..."

I whip around with a half drunk can as a voice drifts in like the morning rain. This is it. I'm losing it. For a week now I toiled underneath my house searching for answers, for ways to understand the blabbering and apologies he tried to present. None of it made sense, none of it had anything to do with the lifeless corpse of a five year old girl I had to bury.

My mind has finally lost it. I reckon half of the subconscious thingamajig must have fled since she went away. Perhaps it was time to wave goodbye to the rest of it.

That must be it, and a smile carves itself onto my face. Well then, I must at least maintain the shell of a ghost ship. Perhaps Harry has some new words to mutter. Until he's fed, perhaps.


End file.
